Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-08-12
CHICKENS.

The business of raising chickens and
other domestic fowls is to-day ranked
smong the leading industries of the
country. This may at first seem to be
very broad assertion, out l think l can
demonstrate to the satisfaction of the
most skeptical that the assertion is true
in it's broadest sense, and any man,
woman or child who is gifted with
reasonable amount of business talent
coupled with well detlued idea OF what
they are working for Cen be successful in
it. The special cultivation of fne bred
! poultry is rapidly forging to the fore as
! well IS that of pure bred cattle, horses,
etc. Whoever would succeed we'll in tne
raising Ct poultry or any other class of
farm stock must study well their part and
not think they have done all
that is necessary when they have
| brought home their fine fowls and
! turned them loose on the farm, and then
! left them to get their living and shelter
IS best they could.
! know it Is hard matter to get the
average farmer to see the utility of q
better class OF fowls than the ordinary
| "dung hill" but il you can oDce induce
/ him to make fair test he easily discovers
! that there is as much di ference between
| them as there is between good Jersey
or H0lStein and the ordinary Texas long
| norm, and for the same reason-they are
bred for purpose.
! 1t is G. fact that through false pride
m est farmers are ashamed to take eggs
a poultry to market, because it looks
| ike such a small business, and usually
when it is done the good wife has to 60
al ong to do the bartering, when the fact
is that there is more clear money by
"tWiCe over" made on the product or the
| "dung hills," according to the amount
invested, than any other product of the
farm.
The number and variety of fowls kept
by the farmer should depend entirely on
the amount of daily attention they can
receive and the accommodations prepared
for their comfort, but nine times out of
ten no more than one variety should be
kept, and they given the full range of the
farm; where more than one variety is
kept, it is absolutely necessary that they
should be kept separate, or else they will
speedily degenerate into lot of monSrels
of no practical value as fine bred poultry.
If it WAS any other class OF fine stock il
would not be necessary to remind the
good farmer of this simple fact.
But | promised 10 demonstrate the
truth Of the assertion ST the head Of this
article. ana since l have come to it,
find it such sn easy matter that it seems
that every one should know it, and Can
almost hesr the CRY, go, that's nothing
new. knew all that before you told it.''
and easily you might have.
1t used TO be said that "cotton is
king" "coIR is king" or the dairy product
some other product, but never once
was poor biddy and her lordly mate men
toned as being king, queen or anything
else worthy of notice. Among the stats
teal reports OF cur government for 1888
we find that the value of the wheat
product was in round numbers S468,-
600, 600, cotton $4,000, 600, the dairy
$25+ 100000, poultry $3.50, 100000. Where
is cotton, corn, wheat and the old COW
+ beside the old hen-Which is king?
: Again, Ohio is one Of the largest WOO
, producing states in the Union and yet the
, eggs produc, in that state last yeal
nearly equaled the wool product. With al
this We do not produce all we consume
t of eggs to ssy nothing OF the fowls them
r selves that are annually imported. The
. Bureau OF Statistics of the Treasury De
: partment shows that for the year 1876 We
imported 4,903.771 dozen OF eggs valued